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ThinkPads and SSDs Part 3: Windows 7 Config and Power Settings

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OCZ Debacle

I know it has been awhile since I posted Part 2, but the reason I’ve held off on writing this part is because I was in the middle of returning my 120 GB Vertex 3 Max IOPS to OCZ. Unfortunately, their customer service is mind-bogglingly bad. The first rep I was in contact with about my initial RMA request was clearly contracted from Asia and wouldn’t address the questions in my ticket. After a week had gone by and I was getting nowhere, I PM’d one of the American reps on the OCZ forums for assistance, but the service was almost as bad. Every time I asked about something, he had to ask the West Coast office about it (he was a remote customer service rep). After five weeks of back-and-forth communications trying to find out whether or not OCZ had replacement cases ready for Lenovo notebooks, I’d had enough. I asked for a refund, and now am sporting an OWC 6G Extreme Pro 120GB drive instead. It is just as fast as my Vertex 3, and I won’t have to deal with OCZ ever again.

If you have a Vertex 3 and are considering returning it for 1/16 inch skinnier casing, I strongly urge you to reconsider. You will save yourself days of time & frustration accepting and dealing with the casing as-is.


This is the final part of a three-part guide I’ve created that is designed to help users get the best performance out of their ThinkPads using Solid State Drives.

Disclaimer: I am not liable for any damage or problems that come about as a result of following this guide. I highly doubt anything negative will result, but I like to have my legal bases covered.

Part 1: Preparation
Part 2: Hard Drive Swapping and Windows 7 Installation
Part 3: Windows 7 Configuration and SSD tweaks


SECTION A: Activating Windows

  1. Navigate to the ABR folder you made in Part 2.
  2. Make sure both “backup-cert” and “backup-key” files are in the same folder as the restore program.
  3.  Run activataion_restore.exe.

SECTION B: Installing Drivers and Updates

  1. Install the Chipset driver you downloaded onto a flash drive in Part 1 of the guide. In case you missed it, you can download this (on a computer with an internet connection) at the ThinkPad driver matrix under the heading “Windows Install Supplements.”
  2. Install your wireless driver that we downloaded in Part 1. If you still see an Unknown Device named “Network Controller” in your Device Manager after installing it, you’ll need to install your wireless driver manually:
    1. Right-click the Network Controller and choose “Update Driver Software…”
    2. Click “Browse for driver software”
    3. Navigate to the location on disk your wireless driver was installed to. For me, it was C:\DRIVERS\WIN\WLANRLTK\Win7\RTL_DRIVER\Win7X64
  3. Install ThinkVantage System Update (TVSU) using the .exe you downloaded in Part I. Restart the computer after the installation finishes.
  4. Run TVSU. It may appear to not be working, but give it a minute or two and it’ll come up.
  5. Install any critical patches (if applicable) and reboot.
  6. Download and install drivers through TVSU.
  7. Run Windows Update. I’d recommend unchecking the Internet Explorer 9 update intially, because an install prompt halts the entire update process until you respond.

SECTION C: Lenovo Power Manager Settings

  1. Click the green battery icon right next of your system tray to get to Power Manager.
  2. Click the “Advanced” button in the top-right.
  3. Click the  ”New” button right under the Power Plan tab to create a new power profile.
  4. Here are my recommendations for each category (if a setting isn’t mentioned, choose whatever you’d like for it):

System Settings

  • System Performance – If set to anything other than “Maximum Turbo”,  TurboBoost will not be enabled.
  • CPU Deeper Sleep – Some users report hearing their cpu “whine” after enabling this mode.  From what I understand, it’s a faulty capacitor on the chip, so contact Lenovo Support if you encounter that with this mode enabled.
  • Fan Control – More testing needed. I suspect that “Balance all parameters” is fine w/ TurboBoost, but do some testing of your own to make sure.

Idle Timers (will only kick in if you are idle for the amount of time specified)

  • Lower display refresh rate – If you’re having problems with screen flicker when you return from being idle, change this to Never.
  • Stop Hard Disk Rotation – NEVER. This is important for solid-state drives!
  • Standby & Hibernation – Some SSDs have problems with hibernation.  I recommend putting Standby (a.k.a. Sleep) at a time of your choosing and changing hibernation to Never.

Events

  • Choose according to your preference.

Alarms

  • BATTERY NOTE: Choose settings in this section after reading this articleabout Lithium-Ion battery best-practices. If you don’t have time to read the whole thing, here’s a quick summary:
    • Optimal life if kept above 20% remaining
    • Keep in low-temp environment
  • Critical low batt alarm – If you have a SSD, I recommend changing the Action to Standby or Shut Down.

Advanced Settings

  • Hybrid sleep – This writes memory data to disk AND keeps computer in low-power state. Disallow this feature.
  • Link state power management – Set to “Off” to be safe.

SECTION D: Miscellaneous Extras

Better Sound on the W520

  1. Go into the Control Panel
  2. Click the category Hardware and Sound
  3. Click SmartAudio
  4. Click the icon that looks like an audio mixer
  5. Click on the “Custom” icon to the far right of the equalizer presets
  6. Change the sliders as recommended in this thread.

Windows 7 & SSD Helpful Links



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